


bubblegum #ffc1cc

by angielovemail



Category: Ensemble Stars! (Video Game)
Genre: Character Study, Female Pronouns for Narukami Arashi, Gen, Oogami Koga centric, all of undead + a couple other third years r mentioned, its my 2-B and third year bias shining through, kind of, ofc is kogas lil sister btw, oh right
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-12
Updated: 2019-04-12
Packaged: 2020-01-11 23:11:52
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,552
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18434081
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/angielovemail/pseuds/angielovemail
Summary: Narukami’s head tilted. “Your…sister?” It sounded to be more of a question than a statement, and Koga shrugged once more, twirling his pen between his fingers.“Yeah. My sister, Hirokon, six and three quarters, turnin’ seven in april. Her favorite color’s pink so, ah, by default so’re my nails.”





	bubblegum #ffc1cc

**Author's Note:**

> i’d like to thank my friend erin for beta reading n helping me edit !!! [:

His leg was bouncing. Koga knew that he should stop, pause, and try concentrating on the english lesson. Nonetheless, his leg bounced.  
  
Sounds of his uniform fabric rustling combined with the insistent tapping of his pen was amplified in the near silent classroom, and yet Koga did nothing to stop his movements. The material of his boots were creasing from the jump of his leg. Koga could feel the oncoming wrinkles in his—one-hundred percent vegan leather, thank you very much—very cool, very trendy, and excessively expensive burgundy Doc Martens.   
  
That was the thought that weighed down on him most, which may just be a little bit sad. The concentration of his classmates could be put on the backburner, but God forbid Koga’s nearly sixteen thousand yen boots became creased.   
  
If he felt like being truthful, he would admit that he was antsy for the day to end so he could go home. No, not home to his rickety, one bedroom apartment, but _home_ . Winter break would start in approximately forty minutes if Kunugi was feeling generous and decided to cut his ramblings on double negatives short. Either way, never-nots and can’t-see-no-ones aside, Koga will go home to his family he’s been apart from for months.. To his parents, who he last saw months ago, and the family dog, Ryoichi, and most importantly: his little sister.   
  
She should be finishing up her first few months of the first grade. It hurt knowing he couldn’t see her off on her first legitimate day of school. Living far from his dream school was an obstacle, and it was one he had to pay for if he wanted to achieve his dream of becoming a professional idol. In the long run, it may just be more beneficial anyways. Koga preened at the thought of him and Adonis graduating to join his senpais and debuting as UNDEAD once more, assuring connections in the world of professional idols. That may be a tad generous, though, as Koga had no idea how Rei and Hakaze would be able to function with their underclassmen.

If in the future, Hiroko—sweet, small, still afraid of bikes without training wheels and frogs in the garden Hiroko—wanted to meet an idol, someone she looked up to, fawned over maybe—(the thought of which causes Koga’s eyes to slightly widen, fingers tightening the grip around his pen; because oh no oh God oh no no no she’s growing up isn’t she? And Koga will miss most of it in the name of pursuing his own dreams and subsequently separating himself from his family because of it).   
  
He feels his eyes flutter shut, and he breathes in, focusing on just that breath and just that breath alone. He can do this. If giving his sister the ability to meet her inevitable celebrity crushes, bragging rights about her brother being famous and cool, and the ability to bring her gifts back from the many tours he’s sure to have, then it will all be worth it.   
  
As he continues to mull around in his break-induced daze, he notices shuffling out of the corner of his eye and—oh. Would you look at that. The lesson has ended and Koga can safely say that he cannot recall anything that Kunugi-sensei had attempted to drill into him and the rest of 2-B for the life of him. With an ended lesson comes the end of the school day in a whole. Koga shoves the assortment of rainbow pens into an open compartment of his bag, snatches his notebook, and hastily makes his way out of the classroom, nearly sprinting through the halls to get to the bus station as fast as humanly possible.   
  
He pauses for a moment, considering his last thought. If he’s a wolf then does the term ‘humanly possible’ really apply to him? He’s not a human, really, just a ferocious, bloodthirsty wolf in disguise, and maybe he should reconsider some of the popular phrases he uses on a daily basis. Ah, whatever, he got the point across. The point being he wanted to get to his home, grab Leon, and get on the nearest train to Wakayama in as little time as he could manage.

 

* * *

 

He managed well, Koga thinks. It’s been around four hours since he had unlocked the front door to his apartment, managed an overexcitable Leon into his travel carrier, and arrived at the train station.  
  
Despite having been riding the train by himself for years, Koga is still somewhat anxious about doing so, hyper aware of all the people around them. For whatever reason he anticipated stares, and sunk into himself a little bit more. He got off at the next stop, anyways, so it’s not like strangers on the train will matter in the long run.

 It’s been roughly an hour and a half of him sitting at his kitchen table, gazing at Hiroko’s new additions to their walls, faeries and Nintendo characters alike drawn in crayon with the precision only a grade schooler could manage. Her creations rivaled his own. He reminisces of crayola markers and Eldritch horrors participating in many a bloodbath. Also monster trucks. Koga drew a lot of monster trucks.  
  
He breathed in again. He sat in pleasant silence, broken occasionally by the sound of his mother bustling around the kitchen with a pop song on as white noise.

Hiroko’s excitement to see him left her without a wink of sleep the night before, his mother said. She was currently taking a nap in the guest room, completely unaware of Koga’s arrival. That was fine, he supposed. They could get to true mischief making tomorrow.  
  
He was pulled out of his thoughts by the crooked smile of his mom. “Dinner’s ready, Koga. Wake up Hiroko, would you?”   
  
Koga mumbled an affirmative, and walked to the guest room. He knocked lightly on the wall beside the door and nudged the door open to see Hiroko, sleeping with a content smile quirked on her lips.   
  
He felt his eyebrows unfurrow, forehead relaxing near instantly. He is struck by how glad he is to have a caring, support net of a family; to not receive the taunts and cruel giggles of one too many sisters, or be forced out of the house, running away from one too many arguments with an uncooperative father, or—God forbid—be stuck as the heir of some weird vampiric family run cult. He was lucky to be able to see his sister sleeping in peace, and feel content because of that, and have his mom around to make home cooked meals; his favorites, in fact, to celebrate his coming home.

He blinks, and the moment is over.He finds he has newfound respect for 3-B’s Kiryu, because he only had to ruin the peace and wake his sister up once, could you imagine doing that every day? Nonetheless, he makes his way to her sleeping figure, curled into herself like a cat. He grabs her shoulder, gently shaking her into consciousness. He’d be a liar if he said the excited glimmer in her eyes at the sight of him didn’t make him want to sacrifice the world for her to stay like this forever, unbothered with petty drama and school wars and the unneeded worries life piles onto you. If Koga needed to harness the sun to make her happy, then so be it; for now, however, he thinks his presence in the house is enough.

 “Niichan?” She blinks once, twice, a third time, and Koga laughs at the supposed shock of seeing him here.

 “Yeah, Hirokon, ‘s me: Niichan.” Here he puts on his impression of a battle hero, having learned from Morikawa’s gestures that being over the top was key.

 Her giggles filled the room as he picked her up by the torso and pulled her off of the bed, muscles straining slightly at the unexpected weight.

 “Geez, have you been goin’ to the gym while I’ve been out, Hirokon? If you keep it up ‘m not gonna be able to carry you any more…” He let out a playful sigh, shaking his head in attempted sorrow, probably outselling any of Hibiki’s known performances.

 She gasped, “Noooo! K’ga-niichan!! If you don’t then I’ll never be able to fly again!”

 Koga shook his head once more. “Tough luck then, I guess. We’ll have to make do….but with what, I wonder…” He hummed, purposefully letting his sentence trail off, already knowing how to please her. “...Ah, I guess I could switch roles for a day, maybe, I dunno...be a pony…?”

 He watched as her eyes widened. “Niichan!!! Can we?! Please~~ We never play ponies….”

 Koga snorted. “Yeah. We can be ponies. Not now, though, Ma’s got dinner done. C’mon, she made Yakiniku.”

 Hiroko’s head shot up. “Really?! Bet you can’t beat me to the table!” As soon as the sentence was finished she shot out of the room, Koga following behind at a much more relaxed pace.

 And so they ate in a relaxed atmosphere, simply enjoying each other’s presence. It seems as if the entirety of break passed by this way, much too quickly for Koga’s liking. Before he knew it, the night before he had to return to Hyogo for school had arrived.

 He sat cross legged, sitting on Hiroko’s decorative rug. She grasped his hand with her small and delicate fingers. Koga watched as she applied a hot pink shade to his ring finger. She had wanted to try out her new polishes, and there was no one better to do it on than her older brother.

 ...Which made Koga sigh. The pink was _really_ interfering with his bad boy image, but his sister had gotten disgustingly good at puppy dog eyes in the months he’d been away.

 And so he sat, watching his nails get painted one by one, and waiting for them to dry afterwards. By the time Hiroko had finished, it was her bedtime, and he tucked her in with a smile and a promise to return as soon as possible.

* * *

 

 The next morning, he was on a train. Already the feeling of hollowness joined him; the burns of many strangers’ gazes on his magenta hand gripping the pole he was standing against did little to comfort him.

 As he spent the last day of break alone, his nails drew his eyes. It wasn’t a big deal and logically, Koga knew this. Knew it was just some paint that’d come off eventually. Who cared what the sneering faces of early morning subway goers thought? He huffed, then, eyes downturned. He already knew the answer.

 …Really, though. He thought as he stared unblinkingly at his bedroom ceiling, hours later. It’s not like it matters. ‘Cuz it doesn’t. Really. Units paint their nails all the time for lives, and Rei practically drowned in the stuff his second year, whether he was performing or not.

 Still…he worried. He worried over this small nothing and couldn’t sleep. It’s not like he would remove the polish prematurely. No, this holds the last night he had spent with his sister. The feeling of her lavender carpet plush under his feet, repeat episodes of Doraemon playing in the background, Hiroko’s proud smile as she stopped to admire her handiwork. Yeah. No. Koga was not taking it off, and he was going to sleep.

 He did not end up going to sleep. Instead he sat irritable at his breakfast table, as he made some of that peppermint blended coffee, put it in a to-go cup, and headed for the bus station.

 The lack of sleep caused him to be so frazzled that the thought of his nails left his mind completely; it was only until he caught Narukami looking at him funny before class started that he remembered.

 His brows furrowed on instinct, his nose twitching slightly. “You got somethin’ t’ say?”

 She blinked shaking her head, flapping one hand from side to side, seemingly trying to swipe the accusation away physically. “Oh, no, I was just wondering, like, where you got them done? The lines are really clean.”

 Now it was Koga’s turn to blink, feeling his blush dust his cheeks slightly as well as the tips of his ears. “Oh.” He paused, before shrugging, deciding that there was no harm in telling the truth in this case. “I didn’t go anywhere, actually. My sister wanted to try somethin’ out.” He huffs, feeling his lips betray him, and curve into a small smile at the thought. Hiroko was so talented already, Koga could not wait to see what she would become.

 Narukami’s head tilted. “Your…sister?” It sounded to be more of a question than a statement, and Koga shrugged once more, twirling his pen between his fingers.

 “Yeah. My sister, Hirokon, six and three quarters, turnin’ seven in april. Her favorite color’s pink so, ah, by default so’re my nails.”

 He saw her smile, eyes softening ever so slightly. “I think that’s really sweet, Koga-chan.” He felt his lip jut out, and defaulted to scratching the back of his neck, eyes pointedly staring at the floor and Kagehira’s newest fabric monstrosity instead of her.

 “...It’s not really anythin’ special. ‘M just doin’ the basic requirements of bein’ a decent older brother.”

 A disinterested voice spoke out. “Ah, Doggie, you’re doing better than decent. Better than anyone I know, anyways.”

 Koga decided to let the obvious diss against his unit leader slide, and instead slid his golden gaze over to meet Ritsu’s half awake red eyes. “Well then…thanks, Ritchii. I guess.”

 Narukami scratched her cheek. “Well, I was wondering if this is just a one time thing, or if you were interested in painting them again…?” The statement trailed off into a question, one Koga pondered over for a second or two.

 “...Because, Izumi-chan just recommended me this new place, really small, apparently it’s a little hole in the wall place, with really good service. And, y’know, if Izumi-chan likes something it must be really good, he wouldn’t let just anyone touch his nails, you know. However, ah, Mika-chan and I were already planning on going, but if you’d like to join you’re free to come with us! If not that’s fine too i jus—”

 “Sure.”

 She stopped, pausing after she had been cut off from her nervous ramblings. “Really? You want to?”

 Koga leaned back, feigning nonchalance. Yeah. Forget Hibiki, Koga should be the true drama club president. “Sure, I mean, pink’s not really my color…Red would look cool, though.”

 She smiled once more. “Well then, I’ll text you once I get a time figured out. Did you hear that, Mika-chan? Koga-chan’s going to come with us to the nail salon.”

 Kagehira turned around, absentmindedly sewing buttons onto something that resembled one of Koga’s aforementioned wall drawings. “...Nneh? Oh, ah, really?! It’ll be good ‘ta getta know ya better, Kokkun!” He looks up and smiles, nearly pricking his thumb in the process.

 Koga smiles back, carefree in a way he was unable to be the night before. “Yeah, same goes to you, Kagehira.”

 When the day ends, Koga realizes this is the first time he’s gotten along with his classmates in months. He could get used to this, he thinks with a small smile.

  
  


**Author's Note:**

> thank u so much for readin!!! sorry if it reads a lil odd/is a tad ooc..not only is it my first time writing enstars but its my first published fic in three or so years! so please bear with me!
> 
> if u want to discuss 2-B w me my twitter is @marrymematsuura !


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